Most of your points are entirely fair, and my experience may have been unique (lived in the centre of a succession of European cities and used trains extensivel

Most of your points are entirely fair, and my experience may have been unique (lived in the centre of a succession of European cities and used trains extensively throughout Europe for many years). Not every train is easy to work on, but with a minimum of planning I can usually design a long-distance journey such that the probability of being able to work during most of the trip is very high. My productivity doesn't depend on access to the Internet every minute of the day; for others the frequent loss of mobile connectivity e.g. on some routes in Germany would be a problem. > Virtually any airline outside of the no-frills-Ryanair sector happily sells you flexible tickets (often for price). This is not the same thing. I do not need to tell anyone that I have decided to take a later train using my open train ticket.